Like I said before, Kojima is the Christopher Nolan of videogames. He may stick to the same IP, but each game he makes is somehow different from the last one, and there are plenty of surprises along the way. I too loved the vibe to the Phantom Pain trailer..I love that piano at the end of the trailer when the title for the game appears. It's so Kojima and surreal.

Hideo Kojima talks MGR, Fox Engine and The Phantom Pain

A Hideo Kojima game doesn't quite require any hoopla behind it, but the iconic developer has taken the opportunity to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Metal Gear franchise, and the release of Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance next month in the Middle East by visiting Dubai and meet his scores of fans around the region.

But before he gets into the nitty-gritty of it, IGN Middle East had the opportunity to have a brief chat with him at a press conference today. Join us as we pick his brains on all things Metal Gear, and more.

IGN: The Metal Gear series is celebrating its 25th anniversary. 25 years of amazing games. How do you feel about that? What has the journey been like?

Kojima: To be honest, I never imagined it was going to be 25 years. Every time I completed a game, I told myself ‘this is it, this will be the last one’, but kept on making new Metal Gear games, and before I know, it was 25 years. What I mean is that, if you created a game thinking that ‘okay, I am going to make this for the next 25 years’, it’s not going to happen.

Now coming to Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, when we look at Metal Gear Solid, it’s completely different from the franchise we are used to. Metal Gear Solid never truly had a competitor in its stealth-espionage genre, but Revengeance is a high speed hack-and-slash action adventure, which can be easily compared to other games from more experienced publishers. What was the thought process behind this?

Well, if you look at it, I suppose you could say that’s right! But basically, Revengeance is a spin-off along with the mainstream release that is Ground Zeroes. For the spin-off, we wanted to have variety, and I wanted to expand our reach to gamers who like hack-and-slash and hope to get accepted there as well. So that was our main goal as you can play with a few things in a spin-off, but Ground Zeroes will be conventional.

Right, even though it’s a game in a different genre, it still falls under the Metal Gear roof, and I am sure fans will enjoy it as much as the others in the series. Now related to that, and this is a much asked fan question, why was Raiden chosen as the ninja-cyborg guy in Revengeance instead of someone like Gray Fox?

It was actually not my idea, it was my staff in Kojima Productions that insisted on Raiden, and I respected their idea. I wanted to really focus on production than development, and they wanted to come up with a really cool hack-and-slash title with some Katana action and Raiden in it, and I thought ‘okay, that’s fine, I respect that’.

But in my personal opinion, I wanted to go for Frank Jaegar or Gray Fox. But if we had gone with that, I would have had to write the script and then be really committed to creating the game. I want to pass game development to the younger generation in my team, and have been trying to do so for quite some time. Before I never could give complete responsibilities for other games, but for Revengeance, they are fully in control. Besides, if I had created the game and directed it, it wouldn't have been this game. I am very happy to see the growth in my team and how they have developed such an incredible game.

Shifting gears to what’s to come in the future. We have seen bits and pieces of the FOX Engine. We know about Project Ogre, we have seen the screenshots you have shared with us. I must admit, the new visual engine looks quite fantastic. What do you plan to achieve with the technologies that you are building, and how do you see it utilize the next-generation of consoles?

I can’t share much details about it yet, but the new engine is built towards not only having better visual quality, but also better functionality that will allow new kinds of gaming experiences, UI, playability, etc., and that is something we at Kojima Productions are working at, and some of which will be incorporated into Ground Zeroes.

In terms of technology, FOX Engine is very efficient and that’s one of our focuses as well. We are continually trying to make it as efficient as possible, and with it, we can develop games in a much shorter time period than ever possible before.

Finally, have you seen the new Phantom Pain trailer?

[Laughs] Yes, yes I have. I really liked it.

So did we. Would you like to say something about it?

It was very visually appealing. The lighting was very good.

The trailer also looks familiar, especially the character, his mullet…we have seen him somewhere before…

[Kojima’s translator pitches in] Snake?

Yes!

Kojima: Oh! [laughs] It might have been an inspiration…

Sure…inspiration! Anyways, thanks a lot for your time. Any words for your fans in the Middle East?

Well, we are working on Ground Zeroes which will take a little more time. But there is Revengeance releasing next month, so why not play that while you wait for the new Metal Gear Solid.

Thanks to Kwes for the signature!
"As long as there are dreamers who have the courage to pursue their dreams, the world will have heroes. And as long as there is a thirst to discover the unknown, there will be new stories to tell...and new adventures to be had."

Thanks to Kwes for the signature!
"As long as there are dreamers who have the courage to pursue their dreams, the world will have heroes. And as long as there is a thirst to discover the unknown, there will be new stories to tell...and new adventures to be had."

My guess is that it's Psycho Mantis' (or a similar character's) hallucinogens. You certainly see someone looking awfully like him at the end of the trailer. And he's floating behind one of the enemy soldiers, too, as if he's been assisting them the entire time.

The doctor doesn't even mention his arm. Makes me wonder if the arm is a hallucination, too. After all, he can't "feel his body" anyways. Probably part of the side effects.

MGS: Ground Zeroes Goes Nextgen?

An interesting bit from another interview with Kojima that was conducted when he was in Dubai, from DvLZGame (keep in mind this is a translation).

Kojima was asked if Ground Zeroes will be released for next gen systems. He answered that this was ‘a secret he could not talk about’.

The interviewer continued by saying he expected Microsoft and Sony to announce their new consoles this E3 or sooner, and he expects to see more of Ground Zeroes then, since he believes it will be for those systems. Kojima replied by saying: “We will see about this one day… Maybe sooner than you think.”

Of course Kojima is deliberately being vague here, so how to interpret his comments is hard to say. But it does seem to at least imply the game is going to be available on the next generation systems. At the vey least Kojima is working on next gen consoles with the FOX Engine. All we can do now is wait.

I've never played a MGS game all the way through but GR has my curiosity. I briefly played MGS4 but didn't get very far. If I jump in with this series now with GR or 4 am I going to be uber confused as to what is going on? What do you guys think? Or do these games have backround info in them so I know what's up?

Focus. Control. Conviction. Resolve. A true ace lacks none of these attributes. Nothing can deter you from the task at hand except your own fears. This is your sky.

I've never played a MGS game all the way through but GR has my curiosity. I briefly played MGS4 but didn't get very far. If I jump in with this series now with GR or 4 am I going to be uber confused as to what is going on? What do you guys think? Or do these games have backround info in them so I know what's up?

Ground Zeroes looks to be a sequel to Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater and Peace Walker so I would recommend playing through them.

Thanks to Kwes for the signature!
"As long as there are dreamers who have the courage to pursue their dreams, the world will have heroes. And as long as there is a thirst to discover the unknown, there will be new stories to tell...and new adventures to be had."

It's looking that way. I mean, if you look at what it appears to be a huge whale eating a helicopter. Yeah, only in dream can that actually happen. And the whole arm missing thing with snake, doesn't add up. It has to be a dream. Also there's hints in the trailer telling him to wake up and if it really is a dream. Kojima finds ways to really blow people's minds away.

am i the only one who can see how the whale looks remarkably similar to metal gear ray (in mgs2 when it dives off the tanker)

drug induced hallucinations causing altered vision of what could be a metal gear rather than a whale...

Thanks to Kwes for the signature!
"As long as there are dreamers who have the courage to pursue their dreams, the world will have heroes. And as long as there is a thirst to discover the unknown, there will be new stories to tell...and new adventures to be had."

MGS3 is the best in the series in many people's opinions so you'll probably have plenty of fun with it. I still have to play Peace Walker though. I'll probably buy it off the store at some point.

Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk 2

people say PW is too, I think its more a Big Boss thing
I actually prefer MGS2, although I love MGS3 just as much, in fact I love them all
And Pod, play the whole series
Every MGS refers to its sequel, even before its made and the sequal reference its predecessor too
Play them back2back and you see

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